Earth 616000
by sdl64533
Summary: AU X-Men. This universe is blended from X-Men evolution, X-Men comics, and X-Men movies. I've always felt that Toad was a good guy at heart-he's never actually killed anyone in the comics and he gets treated like crap while working as a janitor for the X-Men. I'm also intrigued by Elizabeth. Toad x Elizabeth. Rated M for Toad aka Todd / Mortimer / Toynbee / Tolensky swearing.
1. Prologue

A girl with medium length blonde hair exited Salem High School's library. Her green eyes smiled at the janitor who was locking up the library behind her. Elizabeth wore her green backpack over both shoulders as she ambled down the empty halls. It was Friday, long after the final bell had rung and she'd spent too long reading in the library. She'd finally been kicked out when it came time to lock up. She didn't mind the walk home back to the Institute. Elizabeth was a little surprised to hear voices as she came close to passing by the art classroom. The art teacher, Mrs. Kinsley, sounded upset and almost angry. Elizabeth slowed down because she didn't want to interrupt the conversation, especially since it sounded like an argument.

"Your work is only average, Mr. Toynbee, and your work ethic is abysmal," Mrs. Kinsley sounded pompous to Elizabeth.

Elizabeth heard the sound of Mrs. Kinsley's low heels snapping on the hard floor as she walked away. Elizabeth cautiously peered around the corner of the hallway, in time to see the skinny sophomore people called Toad toss a notebook into a nearby trash bin. She recognized him by the layered long sleeve and short sleeve tee-shirts she often saw him wearing and his messy brown hair. Elizabeth waited until Toynbee had bounded out of sight before she came around the hall corner.

Elizabeth pushed back the long fall of blonde hair as she reached in carefully to pull out the notebook. It fell open as she did and she saw immediately that Mrs. Kinsley was wrong about his work being average. After a cursory glance through the book Elizabeth put it into her backpack, intending to give it back to him when his temper had cooled down a few degrees. She was sure he would regret throwing his work away.

At home, Elizabeth was used to the antics at the Institute. The loud noises of practice and training sessions, the crashes and explosions, and the general ruckus of students. Eventually, though, it could get to be too much for her. On Saturday afternoon she left the girl's dormitory, passed the basketball court and the pool, strolled along Breakstone Lake and finally found some quiet among the trees. It was about the only place she could be sure she could get some peace. She had her backpack slung over her shoulder, intending to work on an essay for her English class. She knew what she wanted to write but she couldn't think straight inside the Institute.

She sat underneath a tree with the light dappling the ground between the shadows of leaves. Elizabeth's hair was pulled into a half ponytail today, as usual. When she opened her backpack, instead of pulling out one of her own notebooks she instead pulled out the book full of elaborate sketches. Her green eyes widened. She'd actually forgotten about the rescued notebook until she'd pulled it out.

Elizabeth felt a little guilty looking at it but she was alone and couldn't resist. The artwork was really very good. She'd seen Toynbee around school and she had figured out that he was a mutant like the other students who lived at the Institute. He and his clique didn't seem to be friendly with the mutants at the Institute. She thought there was some kind of mutant-prep-school rivalry going on between the Institute and the Brotherhood of Salem Center.

She turned the pages slowly, recognizing the girl she thought of as Scarlet on many of the pages. Her real name was Wanda but Elizabeth wasn't sure she'd ever heard anyone other than her brother call her by her real name. Scarlet, her brother, Toynbee, Tabitha, Lance, and Fred mostly kept to themselves and the students from the Institute left them alone. Sometimes, Elizabeth would see Tabitha and Kurt talking but that happened less and less often recently. There were other things on the pages: rough, incomplete sketches of the human body, eyes or noses or hands or feet, different hair types and styles, different items of clothing, and roses. The sketches of Kurt's unusual body shape made Elizabeth's eyebrows wing up.

Elizabeth chewed on her lower lip, considering. She was torn between trying to return the notebook without anyone knowing that she'd had it and wanting to tell Toynbee to keep working on his art. Finally, she pulled out her own notebook for English and ripped a page out. She sighed at her own work: the page had torn so that there was a triangle of blank lined paper still attached to the metal ring. Elizabeth set to writing her note anyway. She figured that if she didn't sign it then he wouldn't be able to figure out who had written it. Elizabeth folded it into his notebook carefully and wrote a shorthand memo in her planner to leave the notebook on top of his locker on Monday.


	2. Chapter One

Elizabeth, nervous about trying to return the book without anyone noticing, ended up not returning it until the lunch break. She left the cafeteria where she'd eaten quickly at a table with Kitty, Kurt, Scott, Jean, and the others. She had to stand up on her toes a bit to slide the notebook onto the top of the locker. She left a corner of it sticking out, hoping he would notice it before someone else did.

"What the hell are you doing?" his high voice sounded as he landed just behind her. Elizabeth jumped and gasped, losing what must have been ten years of her life. When she met his yellow brown eyes she thought he looked like he was ready to brawl, though he was crouched in his usual stance. His eyes lit on the notebook above her head and he leapt into the lockers to grab it.

"Where did you get this?" his tone was angry. Elizabeth forced herself to speak, putting her hand to her chest protectively as she looked up at him.

"I was returning your notebook. I saw you throw it away. When I saw what was in it I thought you'd want it back, after you'd had a chance to think about it," Elizabeth's rapid heartrate was getting back down to normal as she spoke.

"You shouldn't be looking through other people's stuff," he grumbled, "I oughtta take your stuff and see how you like it." The look he gave her made her think that she was considering doing just that.

"I'm sorry," she told him, "I just wanted to help. I'll see you around, I guess." Elizabeth turned, spine rigidly straight, and walked slowly away from him toward her next class. He didn't follow her or say anything to her for the rest of the day so she figured it was over and done with.


	3. Chapter Two

On Tuesday, he caught her eye as he passed her in the hall. Reflexively, she lifted a hand in a mute half-wave. She rolled her eyes at herself the second he was past her. At lunch, everything was normal. She sat so she could see him over Kitty's shoulder. His back was to her and he didn't look over once.

So, when she sat down at lunch on Wednesday Kurt surprised her with an observation.

"I saw Toad looking at you funny today," Kurt was waving a chicken strip in her direction as he spoke, "Are you okay? Has he bothered you?"

"No," Elizabeth's response was immediate, "I gave him back a notebook he'd dropped. I don't think he'd ever noticed me before so he's probably just wondering when I started going to this school." Elizabeth said the last part as a self-depreciating joke. She had been living at the Institute for a few years and attending Salem High School since school started in September.

"You are awfully quiet," Jean agreed, amused.

It didn't take longer than sixty seconds for Kitty and Kurt to start on a conversation that was fun to watch so Elizabeth lingered over lunch.

Elizabeth's last period was study hall. She usually showed her work to the instructor who led the study hall and asked permission to spend the rest of the time in the library or reading under a tree outside. She was the sort of reader that became so engrossed in a book that a stampede of X-Men usually couldn't rouse her attention. It was one of the few things she could do successfully at home. She was sitting under the tree outside, engrossed in a book, when Toynbee dropped down from the branches over her head.

"Hey," he said, hunched over his black high tops, with the green tinted skin of his knee showing through a worn place in his baggy blue jeans.

"Hi," she pulled the open book close to her chest, "Are you still angry with me for rescuing your notebook?"

"Nah," he said, 'I wasn't really angry. It was just weird knowing you'd looked at it."

Elizabeth didn't want to argue with him but she thought he'd seemed angry. Her green eyes glanced back down at the book she was holding. Noting the page number, she closed it and set it on top of the pile of books next to her.

"I've always wished I could draw," Elizabeth offered wistfully, "I have artistic urges but no artistic talent."

He shrugged, "I read the note you left."

Instantly, Elizabeth felt her stomach drop. Luckily, she usually only blushed when she was angry. Flushed cheeks were obvious on her pale skin, unfortunately.

"Sorry," she muttered, "I didn't want you to stop drawing just because Mrs. Kinsley was being a jerk."

"You're okay," he said, "I guess I'll see you around."

Elizabeth watched as he leapt away, her head tilted and her green eyes confused. She glanced at her watch and realized she'd just missed getting a ride home from Scott. She put her books into her backpack and made made her way home by herself.


	4. Chapter Three

From then on, even if Toynbee seemed to be absent the rest of the day, he usually stopped by the tree during her study hall period.

"What do they call you?" he asked her one Wednesday, "Other than Elizabeth."

"Whisper," she replied, not thinking anything of it.

"Cool," he said, twisting a piece of grass in his hands.

"What do they call you, other than Toad?" she asked, curious.

"But nobody calls me nothin' but Toad anymore," he made a disdainful noise, "My fosters used to call me Morty."

"Oh," Elizabeth hesitated, "What's your middle name?"

He shrugged, "Todd."

"I like that," she told him.

He grinned, "What's your middle name?"

"Victoria," she told him, reluctantly.

"Eh," he looked at her for a moment, "You are more of a Lizzie. Lizzie the Lizard."

Elizabeth made a face, "Yeah, right."

She mimed hitting him in the head with her book, complete with sound effects. He pretended to be knocked flat on the grass, clutching his head, and it made her laugh.

"Hey, can I sketch you?" he asked, abruptly.

Elizabeth was immediately self conscious and flattered. She debated for a split second but she figured that it would help to encourage him to draw. She decided it was something she'd do as his friend, to be supportive.

"Sure," she shrugged. He grabbed his notebook and she tried not to squirm for the next twenty or so minutes.

"Where'd you get the necklace?" he asked, eventually.

"Oh," she looked down at the smiling sun with flames surrounding its face, "I've had it forever. my mother gave it to me."

"I didn't mean to make you sad," he told her, putting away his notebook.

"She died a few years ago. That's why I came to stay with the Professor," Elizabeth told him a partial truth. Really, she'd come to stay with the Professor after her mother had been murdered because her cousin, Laura, thought the Professor would be able to hide her and keep her safe. The fake identity Laura had given her said that Elizabeth Victoria Wilson was actually the daughter of Charles Xavier.

Toynbee-Todd- stood and Elizabeth put out a hand so he could pull her to her feet. He hugged her, gingerly, and she squeezed him back. Todd didn't say much after that but he walked her home that day.


	5. Chapter Four

The next day, Elizabeth was surprised when her study hall instructor told her he wouldn't be able to let her study on her own any longer. He told her Principal Darkholme had complained about students being unsupervised during study hall periods. After she got out of class she went to where she usually saw Todd but he wasn't there.

On Friday, Elizabeth caught Todd's arm in front of his locker after lunch. He was wearing a jacket today, in a nod to the falling temperatures of early Autumn.

"I can't spend my study hall period outside anymore," she said immediately, "Apparently, the principal is cracking down on students being unsupervised during school hours."

"Somebody must have pissed her off," Todd said, looking surprised. He glanced over at his friends, briefly, but they weren't paying any attention. He looked back at her and leaned back against his locker, casually sliding his hands into his pockets.

"Do you still want to hang out?" she asked him, choosing blunt honesty over being late to class.

"Sure," he shrugged. She had noticed he shrugged a lot. She thought he was trying to convince the world he didn't care so much. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes at him. Elizabeth passed him a note instead.

"My cell number," she told him quickly, "Text me. We can hang out on Saturday if you're free. See you around."


	6. Chapter Five

On Saturday, when she ambled out of the girl's dormitory, past the basketball court, the swimming pool and around the lake, she had someone waiting for her in the woods behind the Institute.

"Hi," she said, dropping down to the grass next to him.

"Hey," Todd responded, "How've you been?"

"Good," she set down her backpack, "I've been using those headphones you gave me. You were right, it helps me to get things done when there's music to drown out the noise of the Institute."

"Yeah, music is the only way I can concentrate on anything," he used a piece of grass to make a whistling noise.

"Do you need them back?" Elizabeth was concerned, "I can probably get some for my birthday from the Professor."

"Nah, I've got others. When's your birthday?"

"November 8th," she told him, pulling out a sketch of a dozen roses he'd given her and her color pencils, "You?"

"March 6th," he watched her pull out a bottle of rubbing alcohol, "What's that for? You're not going to drink it, right?"

"No," she snorted a laugh, "It's to blend the colors."

She colored in the sketch he'd gifted her. They were both quiet for some time. Elizabeth became so caught up in what she was doing that she didn't notice when he pulled out his notebook. He'd been sketching her for some time before she noticed the extended silence and looked up at him. She glanced down at herself. Elizabeth was lying on the grass perpendicular to him with her notebook and color pencils out in front of her and she was wearing an oversized mint green tunic sweater with a plunging neckline over a grey turtleneck blouse, grey sweater leggings, and black boots. Her hair peaked out of the bottom of a mint green beanie.

"I didn't mean to be rude and not talk to you," Elizabeth told him, but she was smiling.

"Huh," he looked up, distracted, "I don't mind if we don't talk. Talking is good, too, though."

"I'm sorry about Thursday," she offered, "I felt like I was sort of standing you up when I couldn't get out of study hall."

He shrugged, "No problem."

Elizabeth held up the colored-in sketch, "What do you think?"

"I like how the roses each have two colors. Can roses really look like that?" he asked, curious.

"Yes," Elizabeth replied, "The dual colored roses are my favorite."

Elizabeth slid the sketch back into her English notebook carefully and put the notebook back into her backpack.

"What else do you like to do, other than sketching?" she asked, resting her chin on her knees.

"I usually hang out with the guys and watch television. Sometimes we go to the five dollar theater," Todd laid down on his back next to her, "They went to the theater today but I ditched them."

"Why?" Elizabeth asked, a bit horrified, "They're your friends."

"Lance and Fred are cool. But Tabitha keeps blowing up the bathroom when I try to take a shower," his voice changed slightly, "Wanda told me to stay the hell away from her and Pietro's been an asshole ever since his sister got here."

"I'm sorry," Elizabeth was sincere, she may not have thought very highly of the Brotherhood clique but she was sorry that he was being treated badly by his friends.

He shrugged.

Elizabeth didn't think too much about it, only felt that she wanted to cheer him up. She rolled halfway over and played her fingers none too gently along his ribs. He let out a squeal that made her laugh out loud and tried to grab for her hands. She was fast, sneaky, and agile so he wasn't able to easily hold her off. They rolled around on the ground for a minute or two but eventually he immobilized her. By then they were tangled up together with him behind and beneath her, with his arms wrapped tightly around her to keep her from tickling him.

"What the hell?" he asked, breathless, "What was that?"

"That was fun," she giggled madly.

"You're a nutcase," he admonished, but she could hear the smile in his voice.

"I'm pretty weird," she agreed, grinning, "You're pretty weird, too. It's no wonder that we're friends."

Elizabeth waited for him to let her go, grinning slyly. He obviously expected that once he let her go she'd go back to tickling him. The thought had occurred to her.

"You don't mind me, you know, smelling the way I do?" he sounded terribly vulnerable.

"No," Elizabeth twisted out of his grip and he let her go, "I kind of like it actually. Is that weird?"

"Yeah," he sounded happy, "But that's why we're friends."

"Why do you smell the way you do?" she hesitated to ask but she was really curious. He got a lot of flack for it from just about everyone and she had wondered why he didn't work on it.

"Soap stings," he admitted, reluctantly, "It literally hurts me to wash. Not that anybody cares that it hurts."

"I care," she told him, "I have skin like that. I'm allergic to willow trees and most soaps use salicylates from willow trees as an astringent. Before I figured it out I used to get awful blisters and rashes, especially on my face."

He looked uncomfortable, "It's not like an allergy. I have porous skin like an amphibian because of my mutation."

"I wonder if they have a special kind of soaps for amphibians," she mused aloud, then pulled out her cell phone and looked it up online.

"You don't care, though, right?" he asked, trying to appear unconcerned.

"I'm just curious about it," Elizabeth replied, "Oh, it says you're supposed to use warm bottled water, not tap water, and just rub down with clean water. Maybe you don't even need soap. You should just take camping showers with bottled water."

"What's a camping shower?" he asked.

"Oh, that's what I call the way you shower when you're camping," she tried to explain, "You just use a bowl of water and a cloth or sponge or baby wipes to basically give yourself a sort of sponge bath."

He shrugged, "I could do that if Tabitha would stop blowing up the bathroom."

"Hmm," Elizabeth murmured. She wondered if she could get Tabitha to leave Todd alone.

"Maybe she has a crush on you?' Elizabeth proposed, "Next time she tries to interrupt your privacy you could ask her outright. It reminds me of a little boy on the playground tugging on a girl's pigtails because he likes her."

He snorted, "Yeah, right."

"It's getting dark," he pointed out, somewhat reluctantly.

"Oh, it is!" Elizabeth hadn't even noticed, "I'd better get home before someone comes looking for me." She gathered up her backpack and he grabbed his notebook. Abruptly, he leaned in and kissed her on the forehead. She was surprised, mostly because she often forgot that he was a few inches taller than she was when he was actually standing up.

"See you next week," he told her, and turned away.

"Bye!" she called out.


	7. Chapter Six

They continued to meet up on the far side of the lake on Saturdays. Sometimes they would go to the five dollar theater. In November, he gave her a dual colored rose and a sketch of twelve roses for her birthday. She used wax to save the rose so it wouldn't wilt. Over Christmas break they got to spend a little less time together. She'd saved most of her allowance for Christmas gifts and she gave him a wallet chain and a gift card to buy a new pair of jeans. He gave her a chalkboard made from a platter and a snow globe made from a mason jar. In January, they went to see the museum on a free day one Saturday and in February she talked him into going to the science center. In March, for his birthday, she gave him a sketchbook and art pencils from the bookstore. By then his friends and hers were beginning to notice that something was going on with each of them.

One Friday, at lunch, Todd walked along next to her on her way to lunch and put an arm over her shoulder. It didn't occur to Elizabeth that no one had really seen them spend time together before then. Without really thinking about it they both sat down together at an empty table together.

Fred sat down next to Todd automatically and blinked at Elizabeth, "Hey."

"Hi," Elizabeth said, suddenly feeling shy. She'd never really talked to him before.

"I'm Fred," he told her.

"Elizabeth," she replied.

"You're one of the nerds that lives at the Institute?" he asked. Todd put his face in his hands in frustration or misery, Elizabeth wasn't sure which.

Elizabeth smiled, amused, "Yes, I'm one of those nerds. I'm also an English nerd."

"What's that?" he asked, between bites.

"I like to read novels and poetry and fanfiction," she leaned in and whispered, like she was telling him some terrible secret. Todd lifted his face from his hands slowly.

He grimaced, "I don't like books."

"What do you like?" she asked.

"I like cars," Fred told her, "And food."

"I'm a Chevy girl," she told him, "My mother had a ridiculous, little orange Chevy when I was really young. It was the most awful shade of orange and it looked a bit like Jar Jar Binks. It was so ugly it was cute."

"Hey, Elizabeth," Kitty said, standing next to the table, "What's up?"

"Nothing much," Elizabeth's tone was dry, "Not since I sat next to you last period in English class."

"Okay, well, I guess I'll see you around," Kitty continued on to the table where Scott, Jean, Kurt and the others were sitting. Elizabeth gave Todd a look. He shrugged and played with his food.

"What about Ford?" Fred asked.

"I've always heard those cars called Fix Or Repair Daily," Elizabeth grinned at him, "But I like what's been done in Africa with Ford cars."

"What happened in Africa?" Todd asked.

"Well, there's a huge issue in parts of Africa with infant mortality rates," Elizabeth told him, "A lot of babies die for lack of incubators. A group of engineers worked on a solution and they found that most villages have one Ford car. The villagers maintain the car themselves and Ford car parts are easy to come by in those areas. So, they used Ford car parts to make incubators to save babies from dying. The villagers can repair the incubators themselves, since they already know how to fix a Ford car."

"That's cool," Fred said, glancing at Todd, "You're girlfriend's really smart."

Elizabeth and Todd both froze. She waited for him to say that they weren't dating. She wondered if he was waiting for her to say they weren't dating. After a long silence Elizabeth finally looked at him. He was staring hard at his food. Fred was eating with the concentration that Elizabeth usually saved for studying. So, Elizabeth ate her lunch quietly, too.

Fred finished his lunch first. Elizabeth was picking at her own food when he got up, said goodbye, and left. Todd had hardly eaten. He looked up at her with yellow eyes, briefly.

"We should eat lunch together sometimes," she told him, taking a sip of the soda she'd almost forgotten was there.

"Well, I-" he paused, "Wait, what?"

"We should eat lunch together sometimes," Elizabeth repeated, casually, "Not all the time, of course."

"Yeah, that would be cool," he was staring at her, "Are we going to talk about-"

The bell rang, interrupting what he'd been about to say.

"Tomorrow is Saturday," Elizabeth told him, "See you at the usual place."

"Yeah, see you," he said, watching as she got up with her tray and left.

As soon as Elizabeth walked out of her study hall at the end of the day Kurt and Kitty joined her, one on each side.

"Hey, Elizabeth," Kitty said, "Is everything okay?"

Elizabeth looked at Kitty like she'd grown a second head, "Everything is fine. Why wouldn't it be?"

"Well, you ate lunch with two guys from the Brotherhood of Evil, for starters," Kurt grumbled.

"You shouldn't call it that," Elizabeth reprimanded him, "It's the Brotherhood of Salem. Or the Brotherhood of Mutants."

"Elizabeth," Kurt said seriously, "Those guys are not good guys. They can be dangerous."

Elizabeth felt remarkably uncomfortable. She hunched her shoulders reflexively.

"You guys," Elizabeth said on a sigh, "Todd's my friend. He means a lot to me and I would appreciate it if you didn't make vague, insulting comments. If he's done a specific thing that I should know about, please let me know. Otherwise, shush."

"Okay," Kitty said quickly, before Kurt could say anything, "So are you going to get a ride home with us?"

"I think I'd rather walk," Elizabeth said quietly, "Maybe next time."

Kitty and Kurt exchanged a worried look and Elizabeth turned to go another way. Elizabeth walked toward the tree where she'd spent so much time at the beginning of the year. Before she got there a hand landed on her shoulder.

"Hey," Todd said softly, pulling her into a hug.

"Hi," she said, holding on to him.

"I went to meet you at the end of your study hall but I heard you talking to Kitty and Kurt," he told her, "I stayed back and I heard what you said."

"Okay," Elizabeth drew back to look him in the face, "What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking that they're right and you don't know certain things about me," he told her, "I really like you but there are some things you should know."

"Do you want to walk me home?" Elizabeth asked him, "We can talk along the way."

"Okay," he said, and they started walking, "So, when Scott first met me I was pickpocketing people from under the bleachers at one of the football games."

"Really?" Elizabeth asked him, "You know how to pickpocket someone?"

Her excited tone and gleam in her eye encouraged him, so he pulled her close to kiss her on the cheek. Then he held up her cell phone with a smirk.

"Yeah," he said.

"After you tell me all your other faults, do you think you could teach me?" Elizabeth asked, talking back her cell phone, "I don't need to steal from people but it seems like such a cool skill, like picking locks."

"Sure," he agreed, stuffing his hands into his pockets, "This is going better than I thought it would."

Elizabeth smiled, "I don't know everything you've gotten into or everything you've done but I know you met Scott last year, when you were a freshman. You told me he's one of the only ones at the Institute other than me that you can tolerate."

"I forgot I told you about that," he admitted.

"Mhmm," she murmured, "Well, you neglected to mention the part about you picking pockets."

"Yeah," he scuffed his sneakers on the sidewalk, "Anyway, the guys and me, we steal or commit crimes for cash."

"Why?" she asked, curious.

"So we can pay the utility bills or buy food," he told her, shrugging, "Mystique took off awhile back and we've been on our own since then."

"You could ask the Professor for help," Elizabeth offered, "Maybe even try to make a profit from your artwork somehow. I could help you set up a website and a account. I build personal websites for myself, for fun. It's just food for thought."

"Seriously?" he asked, surprised, "You're not freaking out about this?"

"I'm not entirely oblivious. You've mentioned that you were in foster care. I've heard a few things here and there about the Brotherhood. I take hearsay with a grain of salt but it was a lot of hearsay. You were given some hard circumstances and difficult situations. You've made some less than ideal choices," Elizabeth admitted, "On the other hand, I care about you and I don't believe you're a truly bad person. If the Professor has taught me anything, it's that you don't abandon the people you care about. _Just because someone stumbles and loses their path, doesn't mean they're lost forever_."

Todd grabbed her hand and held it.

"If you want to date me though, there will be a couple of rules," she said offhandedly.

"Oh, yeah," his voice was doing funny things so he cleared his throat, "Like what?"

"First, it should go without saying: If you ever strike me I'll ask Logan to hunt you down and disembowel you," Elizabeth pronounced with dignity, "I won't have to break up with you because you'll be dead."

"I wouldn't ever hurt you. That's not even, that's just, ugh," he was irritated, "I promise I'll try to respect your boundaries. I promise I'll try to be there to support you when things turn to shit and celebrate with you when things go well. I promise not to ask you to pretend to like something you don't, or give up seeing your friends, or drop out of activities you love."

She paused, impressed, "That's an amazing start. I'll promise to do the same."

"I can promise you one more thing," he still sounded grumpy, "I definitely promise you that I will fuck up eventually and probably more than once."

"I can promise that, too," Elizabeth told him.

"Yeah, right," he sounded sardonic.

"You go right on idolizing me," Elizabeth smiled and swung their hands, "I like it."


	8. Chapter Seven

Elizabeth's Sophomore Year

(Toynbee is a Junior in High School)

"What are you working on?" Pietro asked her. Elizabeth was studying at the boarding house today so she could spend more time with Todd. She was sitting on the floor with her notebook on the coffee table. Todd was sitting to one side of her and Pietro to the other while they played a videogame

"I have an Algebra test on Monday," Elizabeth grumbled, giving him a look full of misery.

"Sucks," he agreed, "We don't usually see you studying."

"I usually don't have to," she confided, her pencil tapping on the page of her notebook, "Most of my classes I can get a B without so much as cracking a textbook. I don't think I even opened my English textbook once last year. Algebra is not as bad as Geometry was last year, though. I barely managed a C in that class."

"She's smart, yo," Todd added, with a smile.

"If she's so smart why does she care about her grades?" Fred asked from the kitchen.

"None of that shit is going to matter for the rest of our lives," Pietro agreed, amicably.

"She's a good girl," Jason, the illusionist, chimed in from his position lying on the couch, "Good girls always go for the bad boys." Elizabeth rolled her eyes. Jason was new, a freshman, at the boarding house and he liked to tease her and Todd.

"I want to go to college," Elizabeth explained, filling in one of the answers on the practice test, "I want to become a physical therapist. The programs for PT degrees in college can be competitive."

"Where do you want to go to college?" Todd asked, brow furrowed.

"I don't know yet. I'll probably start at the local community college for the first two years, just to save money," Elizabeth explained, "I can figure out where I want to transfer to my senior year of high school or while I'm getting my Associate of Science degree."

"So, is your mutant ability healing?" Jason asked, "Is that why you want to be a physical therapist?"

"No," Elizabeth said slowly, confused, "I don't have an X-gene. My only mutations are lactose tolerance and having green eyes, as far as I know. I want to be a physical therapist because I like helping people."

The boys exchanged looks. They paused the video game and there was a long silence.

"You don't have an X-gene? You're not a mutant?" Pietro asked, his eyes wide.

"You told me your mutant name was Whisper," Todd said, visibly upset.

"No, I didn't," Elizabeth was confused, "Scott nicknamed me Whisper when I got to the Institute because I'm so quiet. It's not a mutant name, it's just a nickname."

"Your last name is Xavier," Todd said, "How can you be his daughter and not be a mutant?"

"Mystique and Sabretooth have a son that doesn't have an X-gene," Elizabeth pointed out, her shoulders tightening and her guard going up, "I have a cousin with an X-gene. I did not win that particular genetic lottery."

"Okay," Pietro said, slowly, "But Mystique and Sabretooth's non-mutant son is a member of an anti-mutant hate group."

"I didn't know that," Elizabeth said it quietly, "That's sad-and horrible."

"So, what's to stop you from becoming an anti-mutant asshole?" Jason accused.

"I'm not an asshole," Elizabeth shot back, insulted, "If you knew me at all you'd know that nearly all of the most important people in my life are mutants."

"You're the only one that calls him Todd," Pietro pointed out, "You don't call him by his mutant name. Are you really okay with him being a mutant?"

Elizabeth shut her notebook, angry, "I love my family, the Institute, and Todd." She stood up, so furious she didn't know what to do with herself. Todd wasn't saying anything. The controller for the game hung limply in his hand.

"But you live at the Institute," Fred said, as he ate, "I thought the Institute was only for mutants."

"Her mother died," Todd finally spoke, sounding hollow and shocky, "She lives at the Institute because there's no place else for her to go."

"Todd?" Elizabeth asked, concerned, "Are you okay?"

"No," he said. He stood up and went upstairs to his room. Elizabeth started to follow him but Pietro, incredibly fast, moved and grabbed her arm.

"I think you'd better go," his tone was firm, "The Brotherhood is for mutants only. You don't belong here." Elizabeth was shocked and hurt. Her eyes burned but she wouldn't cry in front of them. In a flash that was faster that she could see Pietro-Quicksilver-had her backpack in his hand and was holding it out to her.

"Fine," she ground out. She grabbed her backpack and stormed out the front door.

Elizabeth walked home, miserable. She'd rarely felt out of place at the Institute, for all that she was the only non-mutant there. Occasionally, she'd felt not special enough, not magical enough, because she wasn't gifted the way the others were. Laura had finally come to visit the school near the end of the last school year. That was when Elizabeth had learned that Logan was sort of her Uncle, or at least close enough that Elizabeth had started calling him that. But Laura had been stiff, uncomfortable, when Elizabeth had gone to hug her. When she'd confided her insecurities to the Professor he'd reassured her that Laura's upbringing meant that familial affection was unusual for her. Sometimes adjusting to new things, even when they are good, can be difficult, he'd said.

By the time she reached the gate on Graymalkin Lane she had had a good cry. She wiped her tears away, unwilling to let anyone know how she was feeling. She walked through the entrance courtyard and the Atrium, giving students who waved at her with a shadow of her usual smile. She passed where she could have turned off to the Professor's office and she hesitated. Elizabeth decided not to talk to him yet. She continued to the back of the school to her room in the girl's dormitory.

She threw her backpack onto the bed and fell onto the bed. Elizabeth buried her face in her pillow and curled up, ready to keep crying. Instead, her busy mind wouldn't turn off and she kept thinking about what had happened and what Todd had done-or not done. She couldn't believe how he hadn't taken her side, Elizabeth thought, growing furious all over again. That jerk!

Elizabeth spent the entire day in her room, claiming to not feel well when Kurt and Kitty each came to knock on her door. She skipped breakfast, missed lunch, and finally went to scrounge for leftovers around two in the afternoon. She skipped dinner and woke up early in the morning, hungry. Elizabeth decided that one day of moping, raging, and crying in her room was enough. She refused to be the sort of girl who lost her mind over a guy who was too stupid to know a great relationship when one came up and grabbed him by the throat.

She packed her own lunch and ate an early and large breakfast on Monday morning. Elizabeth squeaked by the Algebra test, managing a C by the skin of her teeth. She thought it was completely unfair. Still, her own misery and scoring so low on a test she knew she should have done well on spurred her to bury herself in her schoolwork. Elizabeth was mostly able to avoid Todd in the school hallways. When she did see him she specifically did not look at him. She didn't tell anyone what had happened but it was obvious that something had happened. No one who lived at the boarding house was speaking to her and everyone noticed. Elizabeth started packing her own lunch early in the morning and going out to the bleachers to eat alone. She didn't want to see Todd in the cafeteria so she didn't eat with the students from the Institute.


	9. Chapter Eight

By Saturday, unnoticed by Elizabeth, the students at the Institute had nearly all figured out that Todd and Elizabeth weren't speaking to each other. Especially, when she didn't leave for her usual walk in the woods. Elizabeth spent some time with the other students in the common rooms but she left before too long. She just didn't feel like being around a lot of people yet. She was unaware that conflicting rumors were going around as to who had broken up with whom. Kurt had confronted Todd and they'd nearly come to blows when Todd had refused to tell him anything. Kitty had asked Lance but Lance had only shrugged and told he hadn't been there for the fight. Lance had been at work on Saturday and he'd missed the drama so he didn't know how serious the fight was or what they had fought over.

"They seemed great on Friday. He came over to pick her up for that movie that just came out and they were really sweet together," Kitty fretted to Kurt.

"It's probably for the best," Kurt grumbled, "She's way out of his league. Toad smells bad and he's with the Brotherhood."

"You're just jealous," Kitty accused him, but without much heat, "She's obviously upset. I haven't seen her do anything but study and work on her homework for over a week. She didn't even leave her room last Sunday."

"She was sick," Kurt protested weakly. Kitty looked at him like he'd said the stupidest thing she'd ever heard.

"According to Lance, they broke up on Saturday last week," Kitty threw up her hands, "Like, I don't know how you can be so oblivious. She, totally, didn't have a cold. She has a broken heart."

"She deserves better," Kurt argued stubbornly, "Toad's just a thug with body odor."

"He's been better since he started dating her," Kitty pointed out, trying to be reasonable, "Like, Toad started going to class more regularly. He even started selling his sketches online instead of stealing. Remember how Elizabeth was so totally proud of him and couldn't stop talking about it? Over the summer Toad even picked up a job washing dishes at the diner. Lance says he's been brushing his teeth." The last wouldn't have meant much to Kitty, except that Lance seemed to think that it was a big deal.

"He probably did something terrible that Elizabeth doesn't want us to know about," Kurt's distaste was implacable, "Maybe he broke up with her because he was only using her to get information about the Institute and she wasn't giving them anything."

"I wish we knew what really happened," Kitty was frustrated, "I don't know what we should do to help her."

"We should help her get over him," Kurt told her, "We just need to cheer her up and she'll realize that she's better off without him."

Kitty shrugged, "Unless they still love each other and it's just a fight. Did Todd say that they'd broken up? I know Lance says they broke up, but Pietro is the one who said it. I tried asking Elizabeth about it but it was like prying teeth and she told me she didn't want to talk about it."

"Todd didn't tell me anything," Kurt growled, "Sniveling little jerk said it wasn't any of my business."

"She's so private about her life," Kitty murmured, "But I'm worried about her."

"She'll be fine," Kurt insisted, dismissing Kitty's concern.


	10. Chapter Nine

Elizabeth got through the weekdays one at a time. Saturday was going to be harder. She hadn't realized how much time she'd been spending on the weekends at the boarding house or just out with Todd. That morning she went to talk to the Professor about something to do with her time. She started looking into volunteer opportunities at the hospital and the pet shelter. She thought she might try to spend four hours on Saturday at the pet shelter and four hours on Sunday in the hospital's physical therapy department, if she could.

Todd was so busy sulking and feeling sorry for himself he forgot to check what day he was supposed to work at the diner during the week. He missed one shift, was late for for another shift, and his boss had threatened to fire him. Frustrated and out of sorts, Toad almost called and told his boss that he was quitting. His sleep suffered and on Friday he didn't even bother going to his classes. His suffering translated well onto paper through his art. His anger and sadness were working out for him, artistically, and he drew more that week than he had in the past month. He spent his free time playing video games and hanging out with Jason, Pietro, Fred, Lance, and the others.

On Saturday he was laying on his bed, an arm over his eyes. He knew his clock said it was one in the afternoon. Normally, he'd be rushing out the door to meet Elizabeth in the woods at their usual spot near the lake. He hadn't cried when he'd heard her leave but he felt his eyes start to burn now.

If I don't go see her then it will really be over, he told himself. She wouldn't even look at me this whole week, he thought.

He couldn't decide if he should apologize. He figured that was probably what she wanted but he didn't know what he'd done that needed an apology. He still felt like she'd tricked him into believing that she was a mutant. He wasn't sure what it meant to him that she wasn't a mutant. Pietro kept telling him that the Brotherhood didn't believe in serious relationships with sapiens.

"Where was it going to go with her, Toad?" Jason had asked him that day, "She hid what she was from you, that's called lying by omission. She's just not like us. She's an evolutionary dead end. You need to get over her."

The more Todd thought about it the more he wondered if she had hidden her lack of a mutation from him. They'd never talked about it. If he'd thought about it at all he would have assumed that she didn't want to be an X-man or that her abilities weren't useful for fighting or that she could do something that was embarrassing. He'd never wondered about her abilities. If he'd never asked her, did that count as an omission?

He wondered if she was put off by his mutation.

There was a sketch on his desk where he'd drawn her flying on fairy wings, with a large toad in the background. It was meant to be part of her birthday present this year. He remembered her climbing on his back a few times so he could jump with her. She'd clung so tight to him the first time. When he'd asked her if she was okay and she'd been breathless when she'd told him to do it again. He had, grinning like a loon, and she'd laughed. Eventually, she'd gotten brave enough to put her arms out, taking him by surprise. She'd told him it was like flying.

He thought about the times he'd made out and fooled around with her over the summer. She hadn't seemed upset about his mutation. He had to wonder, though, if he'd have gotten all the way to third base if he'd been just another non-mutant guy. He couldn't ask the guys about that because he didn't want them to know that he hadn't gotten to third base.

He rolled over, wiping at his eyes, and had to adjust the wallet chain. He was thinking he should probably take it off since lying on it was uncomfortable. Then he remembered that Elizabeth had given him the wallet chain last year for Christmas. Todd swore, fluently and fervently. He rolled out of bed and rose to his feet. He wasn't going to get answers from her by laying around, he decided, in a rare moment of action. He was up and out the door in no time. Todd ignored it when someone shouted, calling after him.

He got to their place in the woods and felt his heart break all over again when she wasn't there. He stood there for a minute, debating. He could go the Institute or he could wait until he saw her on Monday.

If she doesn't change schools, he thought with bitterness, she still won't ever look at me again.

He was angry, hurt, and upset. He had a moment of despair when he couldn't decide what to do and he considered just going back to the boarding house.


	11. Chapter Ten

Elizabeth had changed into something professional looking and she was walking through the atrium toward the door. She had talked to someone on the phone at the pet shelter who sounded thrilled about having a volunteer to help with the animals. She didn't have an appointment but she'd mentioned she might stop by. She didn't have anything else to keep her busy.

Todd walked through the door in front of her and she froze, heart in her throat. He walked up to her, anger showing in every line of his skinny frame.

"You're not even going to tell me that you're breaking up with me?" he nearly shouted at her, "You're just going to stop talking to me!"

Elizabeth went from frozen to flaming temper in a split second.

"Don't you dare shout at me in my own home," she snarled at him, "You're the one who walked out on me."

"You left!" his accusation quieter but he was no less furious.

"You left," she argued, nearly hissing, "Pietro kicked me out." That revelation took the wind out of his sails. He rocked back on his heels, considering.

"He had no right to do that," Todd said slowly, considering that he had secretly hoped she would come up after him so they could talk.

"The Brotherhood is no place for a non-mutant," Elizabeth repeated, tone sharper than a shard of glass, "He told me I didn't belong there. I asked Uncle Logan about it. He said racism comes in a lot of forms, from a lot of sides. He's not happy with you." She glared at him.

Todd swallowed hard, and Elizabeth watched as his Adam's apple bobbed with perhaps more pleasure than she should have felt.

"I didn't know you weren't a mutant," Todd said, trying to regain ground.

Elizabeth rolled her eyes, "I never hid it from you. You never asked. I assumed you knew because it felt like everyone knew. All of the students here know it."

"I'm not a student here," Todd grumbled, but he was having trouble remembering why he was angry with her.

"If an X-gene or a lack of one is a dealbreaker for you then maybe we shouldn't be together," Elizabeth spoke the words she felt she needed to say, even as they hurt her heart.

"I don't know," Todd said, miserable, "I haven't thought about how I feel about it."

Elizabeth wondered for a moment what he'd do if she throttled him. Her hand was clenched so hard on the strap of her purse that she purposefully loosened and flexed her fingers. She debated hitting him with her purse. It was that moment of reflection that caused her to notice that they had attracted the attention of a few students. She knew it would only get worse and the gossip spread like wildfire in the Institute. She grabbed his arm and pulled him with her out the door.

"What are you doing?" he asked, but he didn't resist. He even got the door for her.

"I don't want to do this with a crowd," she muttered, hoping only he could hear.

"Aren't you worried about being alone with a member of the Brotherhood of Evil?" he asked, bitterly.

"Should I be?" Elizabeth asked, incredulous.

"No," he kicked the ground with his black high tops as they walked around the Institute. Automatically, they both headed toward the Lake.

"Why are you angry with me?" he finally asked as they walked along the edge of the water.

"You're kidding, right?" she asked, almost amused but still unhappy, "Your friends found out I wasn't a mutant and started getting on my case for it. You just sat there and let them. You didn't take my side or stand up for me at all. When you got up and left I was worried that you felt the same way they did."

"I didn't have time to figure out how I felt about it," he muttered, but he thought of the mutants they'd passed on their way around to the back of the Institute. Elizabeth was known to the students and the ones who'd seen them had waved to her. He remembered how angry demented blue elf had been about Elizabeth getting hurt.

"I am sorry that I handled it badly," Todd finally ground out, so quietly Elizabeth almost missed it, "I should have talked to you alone instead of just leaving."

"I'm sorry that I assumed you knew," Elizabeth said reluctantly, "And I should have tried to talk to you about it later."

"Me, too," Todd told her, "I made assumptions, too, and I didn't try very hard to talk to you about it later."

"Well, we did promise each other when we started this that we'd fuck up eventually," Elizabeth reminded him.

"Yeah," he said slowly, considering, "Hey, do you want to just say fuck 'em all and keep at this with me?"

"Depends," Elizabeth said, just as slowly, "Is there anything about my genetics that bothers you?"

"I don't think so," he told her, stuffing his hands in his pockets, "Is there anything about my mutation that bothers you? I mean, we've only ever gotten to second base."

The look Elizabeth gave him could have scalded.

"One has nothing to do with the other," she growled at him.

"You sure about that?" he asked, "I mean…" When he trailed off Elizabeth looked perplexed.

"What about you would be a turn-off?" she asked, genuinely baffled. Roughly, he shoved both hands through his hair. He'd started growing it out since he'd found out that Elizabeth liked the idea of guys with long hair.

"My skin is green. I have superhuman strength in my legs. I don't smell like soaps or perfumes or deodorant because I'm allergic," he blew out a frustrated breath and gulped down air, "My eyes are more like a toad's yellow eyes than a homo sapiens hazel eyes. I spit sticky slime and secrete pungent bodily fluids. My fingers and toes are webbed. I have an twenty-five foot long prehensile tongue."

When he finished the last part of his tirade he stuck his tongue out at her, though not the entire twenty-five feet. Elizabeth nearly missed it because as soon as she felt him pause she went to hug him. She held him close and his arms came up around her.

"You're too good to be true," he said, his tone sharp and biting. She could almost feel his self-destructive tendencies kicking in to pick apart whatever good came to him in life.

"No," she said, shaking, "I'm just not an asshole. I'm a decent person. I'm not perfect. Sometimes I want to smack people, even you. I can be petty and vindictive. I'm surrounded by people like you who are miracles wrapped in magic and sometimes I feel like there's nothing special about me. I'm also a weird person. I like the way you smell. I'm not usually bothered by people's body odor. Yours is straight up sexy to me."

She felt him jerk with surprise and she loosened her hold on him. She pulled back and looked him in the face. He stuffed his hands into his pockets while a flush spread over his face.

"Fuck," he muttered.

"I love going with you when you leap as high as you can; it's fun," she told him, "I love your eyes. I don't give a fuck about the color of your skin."

She took a deep breath.

"I've never heard you swear before," he said while he grinned at her, flashing white teeth.

"Well, you made me mad," she said, meekly, looking at him with big innocent green eyes.

"That look only works on people who don't know you," he drawled, smirking.

"I'll have you know that my innocent face works on everybody but you and Laura," she corrected him, grumpy.

"Anything else you need to get off your chest?" he asked, amused.

"Well, I don't wanting you spitting at me," she said, casually, "I have no idea when you having a twenty-five foot tongue would even come up, much less when it would be a problem."

She started tugging on his arm. Elizabeth held up his hand kissed the webbing between his fingers.

"Fuck," he muttered again, thoroughly thrown off, "What in the hell am I going to do with you?"

"You're going to kiss me," she firm was firm on that point, "Unless you're a complete idjit."


	12. Plot Bunny: A thing that must be written

but it doesn't help the story at all.

\- . - . -

The Professor smiled at Elizabeth while she stared at him, agape.

"What?" Elizabeth asked. She was certain she'd heard him wrong. She might have hallucinated. That was possible, right?

"I said," he was still smiling, "Laura phoned us to ask if you are taking any self-defense courses. She's aware that the other students train in hand to hand, among other things. She insisted to Logan that you should be working with him to improve your abilities in that area."

"But," she was aghast, "I'm not a fighter. I'm never going to be an X-man; I'm not a mutant."

"Still," he said, "Laura and Logan have convinced me that it may be in your best interests to work with the new, younger X-men for a portion of their training. If that doesn't suit you then Logan may be able to spend time with you and teach you independently."

"But," she stumbled, "But-But-" and then she started to wail, "I'm lazy."

Logan, to the Professor's left, snorted. Scott, on his right, tried to hide a smile or a laugh with a cough.

"I lack discipline," she added, emphatically.

"I might be able to do something about that," Logan drawled. There was something in his eyes that made Elizabeth wary and suspicious.

"I'm not going to like it," she muttered, then something occurred to her and she brightened, "Can I bring Todd? Everyone always says he doesn't know anything about hand to hand combat."

The Professor's eyes flicked in Logan's direction briefly. There was a pause, during which Elizabeth was sure Logan and the Professor were having a silent conversation.

"That would be acceptable, if he is willing," the Professor finally said.

"Great!" Elizabeth stood up, then paused, "Did you have any other terrible news for me, Daddy dearest?"

Scott choked at the daddy dearest.

"No, Elizabeth," he sighed, "This is the only terrible news for today."

"Sweet," Elizabeth bounced out, already on her phone texting Todd.


	13. Plot Bunny: It drives you crazy write it

Plot Bunny Two: another thing that drives you crazy until you write it

"I can make a bad guy good for a weekend," Elizabeth sang a line from a song that wasn't playing. They were sitting in a skate park he knew would be empty this late at night.

"We've been dating a hell of lot longer than a weekend," Todd returned.

"Damn straight," she told him, and fell so hard against him he thought he might have a bruise later.

"We've established that you," he said brightly, "are a lightweight."

"Are you calling me a cheap date?" she asked, horrified. She was so tipsy he wasn't certain it was true horror or a mocking joke.

"That was only a half bottle of two buck chuck, so, yes," he told her.

"I love you," she told him.

"I can't wait to see what happens when you try pot," he laughed.

"Remember our deal," she told him sternly, or what she thought was sternly. He grinned at her.

"You win," he told her, "I'll put together a portfolio and apply to be a tattoo apprentice."

"The trick to being an adult is to find work you love," she confided in him, "So you can be happy. I want you to be happy."

"I love you, too," he told her and felt the painful, joyous truth of it in his chest.

"I know," she whispered loudly, "But you should still say it. I like to hear it."


	14. Chapter Eleven - Sexy

**Author's Note: I am warning you now that there are horny teenagers mucking about in this chapter. I thought it would be unnatural not to explore what is, whether you agree with it or not, a natural part of the high school years and teenage development.**

Elizabeth didn't spend as much time as she had with the Brotherhood anymore. She rarely spent time in the boarding house. She would go shopping with Tabitha and Scarlet from time to time. She and Todd would eat lunch with Lance and Fred when those two elected to join them instead of eating with Jason and Pietro. They'd gone on a couple of double dates with Lance and Kitty when those two had dated for a while. She spent absolutely no time with Jason or Pietro. Todd wasn't on speaking terms with Jason and Elizabeth wasn't entirely sure why. Pietro and Todd's relationship was still somewhat strained but Elizabeth had hope that Pietro would come around.

Although Todd was Junior, a year ahead of her in school, she was taking English Honors courses and he was taking a remedial English geared toward students with learning disabilities. When they studied together Todd would visit her at the Institute on weeknights. He didn't talk much to most of the students but he got along with Scott, Kitty, and the Professor. He and Kurt still harboured a rivalry that Elizabeth didn't entirely understand. If anything, she'd have thought that the two of them sharing mutations that were written all over their skin would have helped them to bond.

It was July 4th in Salem Center, New York. The boarding house was empty. Fred had gotten his grades up high enough to try out for football this year so he was playing. Both the fireworks and the chance to support their friend had lured the Brotherhood out of the house. Elizabeth had mentioned that she wasn't interested in the football game. She'd told Todd that she had more fun watching the cheerleaders during intermission. Todd had laughed and told her it was called halftime. After the last cheer they'd lit out. They would be able to watch the high school's fireworks from the boarding house. Elizabeth was nothing if not a planner. They had some time before the game would be over and the fireworks show would start.

Todd made as if to turn on the television but Elizabeth demurred.

"Hey, can I see what sketches you're working on now?" she asked him.

"Sure," he said, and took the stairs two at a time. She followed at a more sedate pace behind him.

"Um," he said, when she followed him into his room, "There's only the one thing that's been commissioned but I have a couple of originals in progress."

"Cool," she murmured as she checked out his desk. It was a small workspace, dedicated to his art rather than his schoolwork. The desk was covered in pencils, in containers and out of them. There were piles of empty art pads to one side and full ones to the other. Elizabeth picked up one of his practice sketches, drawn on lined school paper rather than the professional white paper. It was a sketch of her, laying across the page in an oversized sweater.

"That's not," he stumbled over his words, "I mean, that's… That's not for sale."

His yellow eyes were wide and he took the sheet from her. Smiling at him, she let him take it back and hide it in a drawer. When he turned around again she hugged him, burying her face in his shoulder.

"You know," she whispered, "I used to be upset that I was so short. But not quite five foot one is the perfect height for a boyfriend whose only five three."

"I love you," he told her, gently stroking a hand over her hair, "We weren't made for each other though. You're so damn beautiful and people call me frog face. We're not exactly a matching set."

"They wrote a fairy tale about a pair like us once," she countered in a teasing tone, "My toad prince."

"The story was the Frog Prince," he corrected, gently, "In the original Grimm version he turned back into a man when the princess threw him up against a wall. Once upon a time I thought love worked that way."

"Well, I'm glad you know better now," Elizabeth tilted her face up to his, expectantly.

"You want me to kiss you," he murmured, and asked as he often did before they kissed, "Is this real life?"

"Yes," she whispered back, "and yes again."

The delicate meeting of his lips on hers wasn't their first kiss or their last. For Todd's part, part of his feelings toward her was something like reverence. He held her delicately, a thousand times more gentle with her than he was with anyone or anything else in his life. He slid one hand into her hair and his other arm around her waist. She was so damn tiny. Muscles all over Todd's body tensed when she slid her hand up beneath the back of his shirt. He pulled his mouth away from hers.

"I'm not going to break," she pulled back to murmur against his mouth, "I promise."

"I know," his eyes closed as her fingers danced lightly over his skin.

"Are you okay?" she asked, eyeing him speculatively.

"This is bliss," he told her, resting his forehead against hers.

"You know," she said, "This would be easier if you'd lose the shirt."

He was so used to doing what she asked, he'd pulled his shirt up a good few inches before he really thought about what he was doing and paused.

"Is this a good idea?" he asked her, his shirt still lifted.

"Why wouldn't it be?" she asked. Her eyes were big, green, and innocent as they stared up at him. He let his shirt fall back down. He knew her "I'm so innocent" face when he saw it. He also knew it meant she had plans. This woman could plan a guy into a rock and a hard place.

"We're alone, in my room, because you followed me in here" he said, thinking aloud, "The entire house is empty because everyone else is at the game. You knew that would happen. We have time before the fireworks… Because we rushed out as the halftime was finishing up. That was your idea. Most likely, no one will be home until after the fireworks show and they'll get stuck in the ridiculous traffic of everyone leaving."

He gave her an assessing look, "Just how much of this evening have you had planned out? What are you up to?"

Elizabeth sighed and sat down on the edge of his bed, "I planned most of it. I'm trying to seduce you."

"Oh," he stuffed his hands in his pockets, "Well."

"Is that okay?" Elizabeth asked, "I didn't want to tell you because I wasn't sure that I wouldn't chicken out, you know, at the last minute."

"It doesn't matter," he mumbled, "You can change your mind whenever you want to stop. I just, I'm not prepared."

"Oh," she waved a hand at him dismissively, "I've been on birth control for years. Since I was about thirteen."

"Really?" he asked, baffled, "Why?"

She shrugged, "Birth control regulates my periods and helps me with my acne."

"You've never had acne, not really," Todd commented.

"You didn't know me back then," she reminded him.

"I still think we should wait," he stumbled over his words but he managed to get them out.

Elizabeth blinked at him, "I brought a condom. Dr. McCoy has given me a lecture or three about sex since we started dating and he stressed using more than one form of contraceptive."

"Birth control doesn't protect you from disease," Todd added, "That's probably why he wanted you to have condoms."

Todd rubbed the back of his neck. It was embarrassing to know that the X-men knew so much about his love life. He wanted his relationship with Elizabeth to be more or less a private thing. He was afraid anyone else would try to mess them up.

"Yeah," Elizabeth said slowly, "Is that something we need to worry about? I've never been with anyone like we've been together. I guess I just assumed you hadn't been with anyone else either."

He rubbed his hands over his face roughly. There was more than one reason why he wanted his relationship and the things she knew about him to remain just between the two of them. He'd been trying to deflect her with details but he should have known that wouldn't work on her.

"There's never been anyone closer to me or as intimate with me as you've been," he said, raggedly, "But my mother was a prostitute and a drug addict. That's why I was put into state foster care."

"I'm so sorry. I didn't know," Elizabeth resisted the urge to start wringing her hands together, "Does that have something to do with us, with this?"

"Certain STDs can be spread during labor and delivery," he said, his tone flat, "Especially when the woman either doesn't know or doesn't say she has an infection."

"Oh, honey, I'm so sorry," Elizabeth was upset but she knew Todd had to be even more upset.

He shrugged, "It doesn't matter. I figured we'd break up eventually."

"We're not breaking up," Elizabeth's eyebrows winged upward, "I don't know why you would even think that we would."

"We're not going to have sex," he pronounced, determined and a little terrified.

Elizabeth assured him, "We don't have to have sex if it scares you that much. However, just because we're not having sex doesn't mean we're breaking up."

"If this is the part where you tell me we'll always be friends, just skip it," his voice had turned acidic. He collapsed into the chair at his desk, his yellow eyes narrowed at her.

"Oh, hell, no," she laughed, "Not in a million years. I've never figured out how people who have been together can be friends afterward. The good doctor says that it takes maturity and time, and sometimes even then it doesn't work out."

He shifted in his chair and Elizabeth looked at him for a moment, really looked at him. He was still skinny and she thought he probably always would be lanky, like a swimmer. He was curled up in the chair almost the same way he crouched on the floor, with his sharply angled knees already wearing holes in his new jeans. He was all lean lines, sharp angles, and bravado. He was brilliantly, beautifully, completely himself. She just wanted to gather him close and squeeze him.

The leather bracelet on his left wrist she'd given him for his birthday last month and he hadn't taken it off since then. Behind various sketches, templates and inspiration, were pinned to the wall in a collage of paper and pencil. Usually the money he made from his art was mostly put back into more artwork but she could see his passion and his potential so for Christmas she was planning to give him more art supplies. She was written all over him, all over his life. Elizabeth liked to think she was a good influence on him.

"We need to work out our boundaries," she told him, all practicality, "But I'm not giving you up."

"What boundaries?" he asked, out of his depth.

"We need to tell each other what we are comfortable doing and what we are not comfortable doing," she explained, "I'm not comfortable having sex without protection."

"I'm not comfortable having sex, even with protection," he told her, immediately.

"So, we can rule out vaginal, oral, or anal intercourse," she translated, "Is that right?"

"Yeah," he rubbed his sweaty palms on his jeans, "How do you know this stuff?"

"I read faster than any of the X-men, except for Dr. McCoy," she told him, smiling, "I read more than most of them, too. There's also some educational videos on sex available online. We can watch them together. That might be fun."

"That sounds," he trailed off, "Less like fun and more like dying of embarrassment."

She raised her hands, palms skyward, and shrugged.

"To each their own. We don't have to watch them together. I'd like to try it sometime," she flashed up eyebrows at him, "But more importantly there are probably some things you should know about boundaries and consent, with or without me."

"Okay," he agreed, knowing that some guys he knew would laugh whenever someone talked about consent. Todd had veered hard to the opposite end of the spectrum, whatever his reputation. There were plenty of people that figured he and Elizabeth had been sleeping together the whole time they'd been dating. A few others from the Institute figured she held him off with the threat of the X-men when they were alone together. He hated all of it but he ignored it. It wasn't their business and he didn't owe any of them an explanation.

"In the meantime, if you want to," Elizabeth continued, "We could just lie down and cuddle together. We can still fool around and make out until the fireworks start."

"Yes," he said enthusiastically, "That I can do."

"Just to be clear," she told him, "I do still want to have sex with you someday. I understand that you're freaked out about having sex ever. I'm willing to wait until we have a solution that makes both of us comfortable. I want you to feel safe and certain if or when we take that step together."

"But in the meantime," he said slyly, "You want to put your hands all over my hot, sexy body." His eyes were crinkled in the corner.

"I also," she whispered, sliding up against him, "want you to put your hands all over my hot, sexy body."

"Oh man, oh man," he exclaimed.


	15. Chapter Twelve

Elizabeth had two library books in her arms and a backpack full of textbooks, notebooks, and binders as she walked down the sidewalk toward the high school. Her gloves were the kind that became mittens when she wore them a certain way, like she was doing now. She was wearing a heavy coat and rain boots because New York's chill winter had begun. Her hair was braided up and covered with a beanie. She wasn't paying attention, her head in her daydreams, so she didn't hear the sound of wheels approaching from behind her. She definitely noticed when the teenage boy on a skateboard pulled up quickly next to her and abruptly jumped from his board.

"Crap," she said, startled.

"Yo. Sorry," he said, but that grin from beneath his cap and mop of disheveled hair was her favorite, "I guess that's what you get for having a skater boyfriend."

"Lucky, lucky me," she murmured, grabbing onto the front of his jacket as he leaned in to her. His lips were chapped from the cold, dry air but that didn't bother her. His arms wrapped around her waist. After he pulled away from the kiss she buried her face in his neck and kept him close.

"The tattoo guy told me I have to wait until I'm eighteen," Todd told her.

"You turn eighteen in March," she reminded him.

"It costs money for the classes I'd have to take to get a license," he continued.

"You can save up money from your job at the diner or from selling your art online," Elizabeth told him, but her brow was furrowed.

"I have to have a diploma or my GED," he added.

"You'll graduate in June," she said.

"No," he told her, feeling like a man in a guillotine, "I won't."

"What do you mean?" Elizabeth was horrified.

"I failed a few classes here and there," he told her, trying to be casual but he he how upset she would be with him.

"Why didn't you take classes over the summer to make those grades up?" she asked him, feeling a little panicky.

"School didn't matter to me. I wasn't going to give up my summers just to get a grade," Todd was frustrated, "The only reason I didn't fail anything last year was because I was going in every day to see you. Passing my classes was basically an accident. The only reason I passed English this past year was because it gave me an excuse to do something with you on weeknights."

"So, it's just because you didn't show up?" she asked, feeling a headache coming on, "It wasn't a matter of you trying and failing?"

"Well," he scuffed his high tops against the cement but stopped because she'd gotten him this pair for his birthday last year, "I'm not great at English but you've helped me with that."

"Did you fail an English class?" she asked, her green eyes wide and unhappy.

"I failed freshman English and Science, then failed Science again my sophomore year," he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck.

"So," Elizabeth started to think about it, then heard the bell in the distance, "Oh, damn it. Let's talk about it over lunch."

"Okay," he said, slowly, "Hey, you're not angry with me?"

"I'm upset, of course I'm upset," she huffed at him and gave him a dark look, "But we're going to figure this out. There are solutions. You're not the first person to spend five years taking high school classes."

"Okay," he said and walked with her into the school, "Thank you for not-" He trailed off.

"Yelling at you?" she asked knowingly, "Treating you like dirt? It wouldn't solve anything or change what's already done. You know how I feel about apologies."

"Don't apologize unless you intend to do better," he quipped, giving her one last kiss goodbye and disappearing down the hall with his skateboard in hand.

Over lunch they worked out that he could after hours take classes offered through the high school. During the day he could work, either at the diner or somewhere else, and save up the money for the licensure courses. He could take the safety courses he needed to through the local community college.

"I'll be busy," Todd said, examining a mock up of his schedule Elizabeth had written out.

"We'll have a date night once a week," she assured him, "We'll get through it."

"I've never taken a college course before," he told her nervously, "What if they don't accept me?"

"It's a community college. They'll make you sign a paper saying that you know you might not pass the class and you can't get your money back if you don't," she spoke from experience.

"Why?" he asked, suspicious.

"Because you won't have a GED or a diploma yet," she told him, "I've taken a class through the college before. The administration there gave me grief. The lady there assumes that if you don't have a high school diploma then you can't read, write, or calculate basic math. Remember last summer? We met at the college a few times. I signed one just to get her off my back."

"Yeah," he agreed, "So, I'm in high school for an extra year, basically, and that'll give me extra time to work and save money. But I don't particularly want to stay at the boarding house anymore. I don't feel like I believe what Magneto and Mystique believe anymore."

They looked at each other for a moment. They both knew Elizabeth was one reason he wanted to break with the Brotherhood. She didn't think she was the only reason. The way things had been lately in the news she was relieved and grateful that he wanted to leave the Brotherhood. She wouldn't have asked him but it was becoming difficult to justify to herself how a man who loved her so much and treated her so well could belong to a group that was actively working to make her a second-class citizen, at best.

"What do you want to do?" she spoke quickly, dropping her other line of thought, "I know the tattoo artist thing was my idea originally. Is this what you really want?"

"I didn't let myself think about it," he answered her honestly, "I'm afraid to want things too much, I guess. It feels worse when you get your hopes up and something doesn't work out. But I do really want to do something that helps me to get paid for my art. Besides, tattoos are cool."

"Okay," she said slowly, "You get a gold star for self-reflection. Okay. So, you can talk to the Professor about your options. He might know about some low income housing, better paying jobs, or scholarships."

"You don't think I could be an X-man?" he asked, a little hurt. As he spoke to bell rang to signal the end of the lunch period.

Elizabeth sighed, "I'll explain later. I think you could be an X-man if you really wanted it. I just don't think you really want it."

"See you later," Todd told her, irritated.

"See you," she replied quickly, "I love you."

When Todd and Elizabeth next spoke it was on the way from the school to the Institute. He had taken to walking her home and then walking himself home after. Once in awhile Scott would volunteer to give Todd a ride back to the boarding house, especially if it was late.

"What did you mean about me not wanting to be an X-man?" he asked her, still kind of grumpy.

"I love you, but I know more about hand to hand than you do at this point," Elizabeth spoke as they walked, "You're just not motivated in that area, as far as I've seen. If you really wanted to work toward that goal then I would support you."

"Babe, you've never really seen me in action," his tone reminded Elizabeth of the new students before the try-outs, "I've got superhuman strength in my legs, slime spit better than glue, and a tongue that could literally rip a somebody's head off."

She gave him a horrified look and he rushed to reassure her that he hadn't actually ever taken any heads off with his tongue.

"A lot of students think they want to be X-men until they start the tough, relentless, and often tedious training," Elizabeth proceeded with honesty, "I think all other plans involve less of you bleeding. If it's human rights that motivates you then there are other professions or careers that aren't so physical. Dr. McCoy does a lot of talks and writes a lot of persuasive material for the cause."

"You mean mutant rights," he tried to correct her.

"No," she looked at him curiously, "I meant human rights. Mutants are human. You and I are both human. I know that discrimination based on mutation is different than discrimination based on gender identity or sex or skin color. But I also know that saying that mutant rights are not a human rights issue is just as ridiculous as saying that gender identity rights are not a human rights issue or saying that black rights are not a human rights issue."

"Okay, okay," he held up his hands in a gesture of surrender, but he was grinning, "That's already a better defense of mutant rights than mine."

"Dr. McCoy told me once that one of the best things I can do as a non-mutant is to support the voices of people who are the ones facing discrimination, rather than shouting at jerks when I hear about how they treated people with mutations so badly," Elizabeth confided in him, "I try to keep my mouth shut. Keeping it bottled up makes me want to stab those awful people. So, what does your defense of mutants sound like?"

He shrugged, "I don't want to be treated like shit and I'm a mutant."

"What if you woke up tomorrow and you didn't have a mutation?" she asked him, curious.

"Would you prefer that?" he asked, his face solemn.

"No," her response was so automatic she surprised herself, "I don't know. I fell in love with you for the person you are. I guess, if you weren't a mutant then you might be another person and I might love with that person, too, but I don't know, because being a mutant is a part of you. You wouldn't be the same without your experiences as a mutant, although I guess that might have more to do with your being born a mutant and not whether or not you woke up tomorrow without a mutation…" She trailed off, realizing that she was rambling and nearly incoherent.

"I guess I've never thought about it. I wouldn't change you but if you did change then I would probably adjust," she told him, more slowly this time, "If you woke up tomorrow without an x-gene then you would still be you. If you had never had an x-gene to begin with then I don't know who you would be or how I would feel about that person. Does that make sense?"

"Yeah, I guess. I know that I'm pretty selfish," he admitted with surprising honesty, "I don't think I would care about how mutants are treated if it didn't affect me directly. I'm not affected by all those other things you mentioned and I don't worry about how those people are treated. No one treats me like shit because I'm a guy or because of my skin color except that it's caused by my having an x-gene. Hell, I don't even know what gender identity rights is about."

"You and I are called cisgendered," Elizabeth informed him, "In this case, we are both members of the majority. People get assigned a gender at birth based on what sex organs they are born with but for some people their assigned gender just isn't right for them."

"Oh, yeah," he nodded, "Like those men who have surgery to become women."

"Eh," Elizabeth struggled to explain, "Not everyone person who feels a different gender on the inside has the need to make their physical body match with surgery. It's complicated. You wouldn't compare all mutants to Kitty by saying that all mutations and all experiences of having a mutation are like her mutation and her experience with it. For starters, Kurt's mutation and his experience being a mutant are very different when you compare him to Kitty. Talking about the technical or physical details of someone's gender is like talking about the way an x-gene works genetically; it doesn't speak to the human experience so it misses the point and it can be kind of dehumanizing."

"Kitty can pass for a sapien. No one looks at her and immediately knows she's a mutant like they do with me or that ratty blue plush doll," Todd didn't sound bitter, which Elizabeth thought was pretty mature of him, "Even when assholes know what she is they might treat Kitty differently compared to me or Kurt. She's a girl, she has one of those faces that makes anyone want to protect her, and her mutation is defensive instead of aggressive."

"Right," Elizabeth agreed, "Being a mutant is complicated and different for everyone. Gender is a like that, too. People's expressions and feelings about their own gender are about as varied as all the different manifestations of an x-gene. But there's one thing that is simple."

"What's that?" he asked.

"People should be treated with basic respect and dignity," Elizabeth was emphatic on this point, "No one should use any excuse to do otherwise."

"You're face is all red," he pointed out, enjoying her.

"I turn red when I get angry," she muttered, "I can't help it."

They arrived in the atrium of the Institute and Elizabeth looked thoughtful.

"You should talk to the Professor about your living situation," Elizabeth's eyes were intense, "I really think he'd like to help you if you would only ask for help."

"Sure," Todd shrugged nonchalantly, a sure sign he was trying not to care too much.

"Afterwards," she added, "I'll help you with your English."

"Sweet," he responded, much more excited about spending time with her than asking the Professor for anything.


	16. Chapter Thirteen

The Professor, ostensibly unconcerned with Todd's age or his relationship with Elizabeth, invited Todd to come live at the Institute as a new student if he wished. Professor X didn't seem terribly concerned with accepting a new student at the Institute in the middle of the year. Todd was welcome at the Institute.

"Are you going to switch?" Elizabeth asked, her eyes wide.

Todd seemed a little nervous. He rubbed his palms on his jeans and didn't look Elizabeth in the eye.

"I don't know," he finally said.

"You don't have to be a student here," Elizabeth assured him, she knew how big a deal it was to him.

"It's not that I don't want to leave the Brotherhood," he said quietly, "I just don't want to betray my friends. I know they'll hold it against me. I just don't share the same goals with them like I did before."

Elizabeth tried to be sympathetic but she was still holding a grudge against Pietro and Jason. She sighed.

"A good friend will accept your differences and be supportive of your best interests even if they disagree with your choices or your politics," Elizabeth reasoned, "You aren't joining the Friends Against Humanity. At the end of the day, the Professor wants all mutants to be treated fairly, including Eric Magnus, Raven Darkholme, and members of the Brotherhood. We all want a better world for mutants, we just have different methods for getting there."

"Somehow I don't think the Brotherhood is going to see it that way," Todd's glum face was downcast.

"I hope you do whatever is right for you," Elizabeth rubbed his arm to comfort him, "I also hope that your friends adjust and understand over time."

"You wouldn't blame me if I didn't attend here?" Todd asked her.

"Not a chance. We'll get through this next year and a half either way," Elizabeth's smile was grim, "I was raised by X-Men; I'm not afraid of a challenge."

Todd did not score well when he tried out to be an X-man. He was fairly bitter about it so Elizabeth offhandedly mentioned to Logan that Todd's area was more computers, art, and design. When he didn't seem to be taking the hint, Elizabeth asked if Todd could be helpful programming and designing Danger Room challenges and training sessions.

"You're not supposed to know about the Danger Room," Logan grunted as he lifted the engine out of a car.

"Yeah, right," she couldn't help but laugh, "Not only do I live here - I mean hello! - but you already must have figured out that I have been in the Danger Room before. You'd have smelled me."

He gave her a look out of the corner of his eye, "Maybe."

Elizabeth rolled her eyes, "Kurt likes to use the Danger Room to play pirates. You probably already know that. Kitty got tired of being the damsel in distress so I got to be the kidnapped Princess a couple of times. But that was ages ago."

Logan contemplated that for a moment, or pretended, "I know you started spending a lot less time with Kurt and Kitty during your sophomore year. Doesn't seem to me the two of them ever stopped playing pirates."

It took a minute for that to sink in for Elizabeth.

"Are you upset with me for being with Todd? Or for spending a lot of time with him?" Elizabeth asked, considering the thought.

"It's your life and you make your own choices," Logan told her calmly, "I'm just pointing out what I've seen."

"Okay," Elizabeth said slowly, "While I consider your perspective, will you consider how Todd could be helpful? He really wants a place where he can feel he belongs and be respected."

Logan stared at her thoughtfully, "I suppose I could consider it."

"Thank you," Elizabeth hugged him impetuously, heedless of the grease. Then she went to talk to Kitty. She would make plans to spend time with Kurt and Kitty, maybe even play pirates together.


	17. Chapter Fourteen

Todd would spend most of Elizabeth's senior year working, studying, and creating new art for his portfolio. They still spent time together and she was usually helping him study during that time. She reflected once that helping him to study was teaching her better habits; being able to skate through her courses without cracking a textbook had fed her own inclination toward laziness. For Todd's sake she attacked helping him study with the fervor of a office supply fanatic. She helped him take his notes, color code them, and created flashcards that a scrapbook enthusiast would have envied. She suspected her own scores were improving as a result.

Elizabeth elected, against much protest from her teachers, not to take AP English her senior year. She selected the basic English course so she could have more time for other priorities, primarily courses she taking outside of high school aimed at preparing her for a job as an emergency medical technician. Elizabeth and Todd could often be found working on separate subjects or levels of the same subject, but still together. Elizabeth found that it comforted both of them to sit together even while they didn't speak to each other.

Todd had Christmas Eve off of work while Elizabeth was on the school's winter break. They had relative privacy because many of the Institute's students were home with their parents. They were cozied up in front of the fireplace together, sharing the same blanket. Elizabeth held her mug full of hot chocolate with both hands while she watched the flames. She'd sent out all of her college applications and she would wait the next few months for letters of acceptance or rejection. Dr. McCoy had convinced her to apply to all of the places she wanted to go, even if she didn't think she would be accepted or could afford to attend. Todd had an arm wrapped around her waist under the blanket and he watched her.

"I can get a pretty cheap studio or one bedroom in Peekskill, where I'll probably be going to college for the first few years," she was telling him, "Once I complete my EMT training and pass my test I can get work. There are EMT jobs available in White Plains, across the Hudson."

"That's a toll bridge," Todd told her, "That'll get expensive real quick."

"I know," she said, "But I need to go to school and I need to work. If I'm lucky maybe something will open up near Cortlandt or something."

"You'll need to pay for a car," he pointed out, then began to rattle off a list of things he figured she wasn't thinking about yet, "Rent, utilities, cell phone bill, groceries, gas, car insurance, renter's insurance, internet, and tuition."

She sipped her chocolate and tried not to have a panic attack.

"You lived on your own, sort of, for a while," she pointed out, "When Mystique was gone for so long, you boys were on your own."

"Yeah, me, Pietro, Fred, Lance, and Tabitha," Todd nodded, rubbing his cheek against her hair, "Taxes make a dent in your paycheck; you won't be taking home what you make hourly. That was a shock to me when I got my first check. Food will work out to be around a hundred dollars or so eaxh month if you're careful and if you can cook without burning the food or poisoning yourself. Eating out will be out of the picture. You'll basically want to spend three dollars a day on food, if you can. You'll want to look for a place that's less than a grand each month, probably a studio that's five hundred square feet or smaller. You won't be able to afford anything more than a few hundred a month for transportation. A new car is out."

"Driving a junker, living in a closet, eating only the cheapest food that I can make myself," Elizabeth mused, "I think I can get a job making twenty-five thousand annually. Do you think I'll be able to make it?"

He shrugged, "You can always come back here, if you crash and burn."

Elizabeth actually winced, "Coming back here means dropping out of college. I really don't want to do that."

"Potatoes are a good buy," he told her, thoughtfully, "They last forever on the floor or in a cabinet. You won't go hungry with them, even if you get mindlessly bored. You'll have to give up your obsession with hormone-free, antibiotic-free, cage-free everything and force yourself to eat your leftovers before you make anything new."

"Those breakfast burritos I like are only a dollar each," she told him.

He smiled, "Sure. You could eat one of those three times a day and your grocery budget would be okay. But you'd probably develop some kind of deficiency or something."

"Cup noodles, the instant ramen, are really cheap, too," she murmured.

"Yep," he agreed, "Sometimes you can get family packs of frozen chicken for around a dollar fifty per piece of chicken. Five pounds of potatoes is a little over two bucks and that's about fifteen potatoes."

"If I eat a burrito for breakfast, noodles for lunch, and I alternate a baked potato or a piece of chicken for dinner then that's," she trailed off, trying and failing to do the math in her head. He thought the furrow between her brows was adorable.

"Every two weeks you can spend about two fifty for potatoes, about ten on chicken, about fifteen for burritos, and fifteen on instant noodles," he supplied, "That comes to about fifty every two weeks. If you have any extra you should spend it on butter or stock up on cheap spices."

"No money for sodas," she said mournfully.

"Yep," he nodded, "You'll lose weight, probably, not that you should be losing weight."

She shrugged, "I have trouble keeping weight, actually. Remember that time I was sick for three days straight? Dr. McCoy almost put me on an IV because I wasn't keeping down liquids for a while. I lost thirty pounds and two shoe sizes."

"Your feet shrank?" he asked, incredulous.

"Yeah, I had wide feet," she told him, "Apparently, they were chubby."

"Ain't a damn thing on you that is or ever was chubby," he grumbled. Elizabeth considered him for a moment. He'd always been skinny but over the last few months he'd started to fill out. He wasn't fat but he had added some muscle. He'd always been a soft kind of skinny. Now he was leaner, more toned. He'd probably never bulk up like Logan or Scott but she preferred it that way, honestly.

"Why are you so grumpy?" she finally asked, "You're skinny, too."

"I didn't used to know where my next meal was coming from," he told her, "I'm not naturally skinny. That's how I know what life's like without money for food."

Elizabeth set her chocolate aside and squeezed him, "It gets better."

"Sometimes it does," he nodded, but he was grim, "I know it could have gone differently for me. I might have chosen to stay with the Brotherhood and my life would've been utterly different. I was going to give up my art when we met. I wouldn't have had anything else."

"Well, you didn't," Elizabeth rested against him.

"I never thanked you for what you did that day," he said, slowly, "So, thanks."

"You're welcome," she told him, "But you don't need to thank me. When it counted you had the talent and you made your own choices, it was all you."

He shook his head ruefully. She didn't get it. He figured that was okay. Sometimes he wondered where he'd have ended up if she'd just left a few minutes earlier that day. Nowhere he wanted to be now, he decided. He gave her a considering look. The ripples of her messy blonde hair were cut short, highlighting prominent cheekbones in a heart-shaped face. Her finely delicate body was stronger than it looked, a byproduct of living and sometimes training with the X-Men. Her blue eyes were beautiful because they were kind, usually.

"So, you're moving away to attend college next year," he redirected the conversation back to her future plans, "Sounds like having a roommate might help you out, financially."

"Yeah, but then I'd have to find one," Elizabeth answered, oblivious.

"Maybe, or maybe you've already got a candidate," he told her, starting to smile, "I haven't got plans that I can't change."

"You?" she asked, "Really?"

He nodded, "I could submit my portfolio to a few parlors out near the college and see about apprenticing near Peekskill. I can work someplace, or a couple of places, part-time. It would split the rent on a studio or one bedroom in half. On your budget, that opens up another six hundred. Plus, I can take public transit or we can split using and paying for the car. "

"I'd have to put that extra into savings," she considered it, biting her lower lip anxiously, "Just in case we hit a rough patch." She worried a little about him being a less than reliable roommate but she didn't bring it up. He knew how to make a little stretch a long way and she knew how to save her pennies. She realized she hadn't ever told him about her money in savings. She was prepared to spend it if she needed to spend it, but she was hoping she could get by without losing all of it.

"It would be there for you, in any case," he told her.

"Do you want to live in Peekskill?" she asked, "What about the X-Men?"

"I didn't qualify, again," he sighed, "After thinking about it, you might have been right. I don't like training so hard physically. I just want to kick butt and take names."

"You can't do that without training," she prodding and tickling him with quick, merciless fingers.

"I care more about my art," he told her, gasping and trying not to squeal. He tried to keep her hands away from him. It was a fairly quick wrestling bout, which he lost.

"I win," she declared, triumphant. She'd wrangled him onto his face on the floor, with one arm professionally twisted behind his back.

"Only because I don't want to hurt you," he groused into the carpet, irritated.

"Uh huh," he could hear her grinning, "Couldn't have anything to do with me having more than a year of training on you."

He rolled his eyes, "Uncle. Now let me up."


	18. Chapter Fifteen

Todd eyed the new bag Elizabeth had started carrying. It was a purse. Elizabeth had carried nothing but a backpack everywhere for the past three years, the entire time he'd known her. He wasn't sure what this change said about her. For all he knew she was becoming one of those women that wouldn't look twice at him or speak to him like he was a person. Why did things have to change, he wondered.

"What's in that thing anyway?" he asked her, grumpy. Elizabeth was amused at the way he eyed the purse like it was a living, biting animal instead of a large black bag on a crossbody gold chain.

"You want to look inside?" she asked him, smiling and tapping her pencil on her open notebook.

"What could you possibly need to carry in this stupid thing?" he grumbled, grabbing the bag. He pulled out her wallet. It was a wallet, just like his, that was clearly from the men's section. He rolled his eyes up to look up at her, his face still directed down toward the bag, giving her a look.

"I don't like women's wallets," Elizabeth told him. He tossed it onto the bed and went back to the purse.

"Keys," she told him as he pulled out a multicolored pink and orange keychain bracelet.

"Hand sanitizer," he replied as he continued pulling out items, "Four safety pins. Enough hair ties to make a braid out of them. Chocolate. Tylenol? Why not aspirin?"

"I'm allergic to willow trees. Aspirin comes from willow trees," she reminded him gently. She felt like she'd told him that before. She felt a little odd as Todd rummaged through her purse. It felt a bit like he was brushing his fingers through her internal organs. It wasn't painful at all, maybe even a bit pleasurable, but it felt more intimate than it probably should have felt. Elizabeth figured she was weird.

"A tiny notebook?" he looked up at her, curious, "Can I read this?"

"Uh," Elizabeth looked flustered, "I guess. It's just poetry scraps and writing ideas."

"Huh," he opened it, "Hardly seems fair that I've never read any of your poetry but you stick your cute little nose in all of my sketches."

"You probably have read some of my stuff," Elizabeth fidgeted, "I submit work to the Salem Center High School's Illustrious Gazette."

"That magazine that gets passed around?" he asked her, vaguely remembering, thinking he'd have to dig up a few old copies, "So, you're a real published writer."

"Ah," she nearly stuttered as she spoke, "Well, only my poetry. I'm not very good."

He flipped through the book and started reading at random.

"Skin white as apple flesh, spirit strong as red rose thorn,

Lips red as mother's blood, temper as yellow sweet corn,

Eyes green as apple skin, with summer flowers adorn,

Hair black as ebony blade. Magic, I cast a child yet born,

From this spell my daughter is born."

"It was supposed to be the spell for a my retelling of Snow White," Elizabeth hid her face in her hands and peeked out from between her fingers, "But I never wrote the story."

"What was going to be your take on it?" he asked.

"I was going to make Snow White the incarnation of the spirit of darkness, shadow itself," Elizabeth rubbed her face, "Her prince was going to be the incarnation of death. I thought I would write about the love story between darkness and death through different lives, across many reincarnations, and different eras."

"You didn't write it?" he asked, surprised.

"Ah, no," she shrugged, uncomfortable, "Your talent is amazing. Mine is mediocre at best. Besides, I start writing something and then I sort of stop? I get distracted, doing too much research and end up not writing what I want to write because everything gets too complicated."

"Hmm," Todd put the notebook aside with a thoughtful look, "What else is in here?"

Todd continued pulling things out of her purse: a lighter, cash, a granola bar, a pack of tissues, band-aids, a compact mirror, perfume, headphones and an mp3 player. He stuck an earbud into his ear and started scrolling through her playlist.

"We need to have a serious conversation about your taste in music," he finally commented.

"Why?" she asked, curious.

"There's country, some girl power pop, and like two rap songs," he sighed, "You need some serious rock music therapy to cure you. It may take years."

"I'll get right on that," she laughed.

"Ugh, girly stuff," he made a face briefly when he opened the small zip lock bag of her sanitary supplies.

"They're clean," Elizabeth commented dryly, "But don't touch them anyway."

"Don't worry, I won't," he told her, zipping it back up and returning it to her purse. He'd gone through the entire bag, including the pile of receipts that she had racked up.

"Why do you save all these?" he asked her, watching as she dumped the whole lot into the little trash bin under her desk.

"I don't know," she fretted, "I just know you're supposed to save them but I don't know why. I read in some date advice article in a magazine that it's a good sign if a guy saves his receipts when you're out on a date with him because it shows that he's financially responsible or something."

Todd snorted in amusement, "It's financially responsible to check your receipts against your checkbook or bank account so you can see if your charges match. It's also a good way to track your spending to see where you're wasting your money. But it only works if you do something with them when you get home."

"I throw them away when I get home," Elizabeth looked at the small pile in the trash briefly.

"Yeah, you may as well not take them," he shook his head, "If that's what you're going to do with them you may as well not carry around the extra trash."

"Why does my purse worry you?" she asked him. Todd shifted his weight. It was his turn to be uncomfortable.

"You're starting to look like other girls," he muttered, not looking at her, "You know, with a purse and all the crap in it. Next thing I know you're going to buy a pair of high heels and start acting all snooty and crap."

Elizabeth forced herself not to glance at her closet. In it, a shoebox lay on the floor with a new pair of high heeled boots inside. She'd gotten the black thigh high boots for her senior prom and graduation.

"High heels!" she widened facetious eyes at him, "How terrible!"

"Ugh," he shook his head, exasperated.

Elizabeth stood up and he turned to face her. She slid a hand into his hair and tipped her face up to kiss him. She pulled back in time to catch a stunned, spellbound expression on his face.

"I keep expecting to wake up," Todd told her, burying his face in the layers of her blonde hair. She smelled of vanilla and passion flower. So soft, he thought as he absently ran his fingers gently up and down her arms.

"I am going to grow and change as a person," Elizabeth told him, "You should, too. Love isn't just a feeling, it's a choice. As long as you keep choosing me, I'll keep choosing you."

I'll choose you, he thought to himself, for the rest of my life.


End file.
